Tale of the Iron Ale House
by Giraffa
Summary: A first part of a short story that I am considering expanding on. Based in Solanthus.


"And she gone flying on!" The crowd sang the last few notes of the drinking song, which echoed off the metal walls. The room was full of spirit, drinking, and celebrating. It was the end of the harvest and the merchants were giddy from coin, happier in the moment of their current fortune than the dull months of cold ahead for them. The crowd was full of humans, beasties, and other creatures that had no similarities to life on this world.   
  
Jitar saw a customer signal over to her to refill his empty jug for his table. She only filled it twice before the song had started, and it was empty again. It was a very successful night for the Iron Ale House. She was thankful that the resident bard, Elaurian, was in a positive mood tonight. Otherwise it would have been disastrous if he started to sing tragedies and death marches to a rowdy crowd like this. Passing by the stage, she noticed the sparkle of coin around his feet and gave him a passing nod and smile as he began the next song.   
  
It was a dwarven anthem, appropriate, since every song that Elaurian knew of dwarven epic bar songs were related to drinking, wenching, or both. It was already past high moon, and the crowd did not seem to be slowing down a bit, but some of the customers did look ready to pass out before they could get another drop down their throats. Jitar was skirting tables and pouring more gully hog ale to be passed around. She was the only server, but did not mind the demand.  
  
Hours later, when it was close to morning, she directed Wekax to usher some of the sleeping folk into the drunk cell which was full of bunks for those folk who were too uninterested in waking to travel to their own beds. Wekax was very strong, and his dark, tough skin riddled with scars proved it. He was a dwarf. Retired now, but he was the best dwarven wrestler in all of Solanthus, and still respected for it. Unfortunately, an unknown assailant stole away with his eyes soon after he obtained the championship belt. He assumed that his eyes would grow back with time, but the healers had said that they were too cleanly removed to have anything to regenerate from.   
  
That happened years ago, but living a life as a rich bouncer for The Iron Ale House was more than what he could have asked for. Jitar never gave him the chance to let him feel sorry for himself, she made him proud and skilled in what senses he had left to him. Almost empathic, or clairvoyant, Wekax was known to stop escalating events in the inn from getting out of hand. He was once known to be speaking with the guard patrol outside the inn, then suddenly with a crash through the front door of the inn, he charged through the kitchen to pounce on a rat that was smart enough to avoid the trap Jitar had left behind the stove. Jitar is still amazed at the incident, after hearing the crashing tornado that sped by her private quarters opposite of the kitchen, that Wekax did not kill himself when the cleaver fell from the chopping block, inches from his nose.   
  
Jitar chuckled at the large elbow indentation on the iron frame of the kitchen door. She touched it and smiled. After locking the door, she returned to the main room to make sure everything was in its place for the morning. Wekax retired to his room, and Elaurian was possibly up on the roof again, waiting for the sun to rise, for his morning ritual. She waited for a while and listened towards the front door of the inn. A loud crash and bone-tearing crunch was heard at the front door.   
  
"That one I would award two pieces for, Elaurian!" She called out as she was locking up the liquor cabinet behind the bar. A small gurgle and howl was heard outside and fell silent. "Insane Bard, but a good one." She laughed, turned around and went into her room for a nap before breakfast.   
  
Jitar is a well-rounded woman about the town. Her past before she had arrived in Solanthus was small in comparison. She had arrived, just months after the second cataclysm, bought the plot of land and built The Iron Ale House in less than a year. She had contractors from all over Krynn come to add their dent into the first inn-fortress in Solanthus history. There were rumors that she paid in large amounts of steel, even for the most simple of tasks, down to the elaborate dark wooden pillars that stand in the drinking hall.  
  
The Iron Ale House was appropriately named. Layers of thick blackened wood and nails of red iron make up most of the structure. Four stories tall, the building overlooks the entire city, which the top floor can be seen from any location in the city if you were to look up. The best masters in Solanthus of course, forged the iron, supplied from caravans. Within the front door lay the tavern area; octagonal in shape, so there would be enough dark corners for those folk who wish to not be seen. Within each wall was a curtained booth with plenty of room to house six comfortably and privately. Many people did meet within these booths and did not mind the rowdy loudness of some of the regular patrons that usually fill the main hall. Opposite the entrance was the bar, complete with stocked cabinet, which was also made of iron. Behind the bar was a narrow hall that is barely wide enough for one person to walk through, which ends at a parlor wide enough for a person to sit in, between the kitchen, the employees' quarters and Jitar's home.   
  
Jitar took off her apron, and threw it onto the sitting couch as she walked through her room to flop upon her down filled, elaborate bed. Decorated in purple, red and blue, one would think this was a room meant for royal descent. Jitar crawled into the middle of the bed and rolled over onto her back and closed her eyes. The pillows welcomed her and the blanket wrapped around her as she quickly fell asleep.   
  
She startled herself awake and found herself lying back in a chair with her feet propped up on a table. The morning rays glaring through the cracked window in front of her was a blinding morning alarm. Not surprised at all of her relocation back to the drinking hall, she thought to herself that she merely passed out with the rest of the crowd. She did have a bad habit of attempting to brag about her drinking tolerance. Josh kept a watch over the Inn if she fell into a stupor.   
  
"Flies balls!" She raises a hand to block her eyes from the sunlight. "Josh!" She hollered across the room, still half blind from waking up suddenly. "Make a pot of hot cider for me!"   
The answer that returned was silent. 'Very unlike Josh,' she thought to herself, 'not to wake me before sunrise? Of all days?' She picked up her cutlass from the table and tied it onto her hip. "Josh!"   
  
She took a look at the mirror angled towards the rear hall next to the bar. 'There is no one down there. Where could...?' She stopped that train of thought and ran behind the bar. "Flies balls!" She cursed at the cold and bloodied corpse lying slashed from ear to ear upon the floor in front of her. Shock and disgust filled her mind as she kneeled down to close his glassy eyes. Some of the blood that pooled around his head soaked into the billowing cuff of her shirt.   
  
"Hold it right there." Jitar froze before she could lift her hand from Josh's dead body. She realized that the drawing of steel was not a friend but rather a city guard. "Get up slowly and drop your weapon."   
  
Jitar felt like a sucker punch hit the wind out of her. Her throat felt paralyzed and she did as the gruff voice directed her to. As she did, her cutlass clattered to the floor and a bladeless hilt spilled out along with a mass of steel coin. Surprised, she glared down at the floor, her anguish deepening as the coins slowly rotated to flop into the stream of blood she was standing in. 'Can anything get worse?' She groaned inwardly.   
  
"Captain! In here! I caught the murderer!" The young guardsman exclaimed over his shoulder to the front door. Almost instantly six more uniformed men exploded through the door and caught the sight of the woman standing over a corpse with coins scattered about her.   
  
The guard facing Jitar gave a wiggle of his rapier directed at her. She twitched and set her jaw knowing that any move that she made would cause much more difficulty in proving her innocence.   
  
"Good job, Reginald, I believe there is a reward for you waiting at the barracks with the armorer." The elder man stated out loud. "Now get this woman to the jail for processing. We don't want her to start a riot with the townspeople."   
  
Jitar could not hold her breath any longer and let a soft wheeze; her tongue touched the top of her mouth and tasted a muddy, salty concoction. 'Either I fell asleep in a gully's armpit, or Josh really deserved to have that smile cut for him, putting mud in his drinks.'   
  
She kept her mouth closed as they proceeded to direct her towards the city keep and down into the jail. Not saying a word, Jitar agreed and complied with all of their demands. After the iron grate closed behind her, the clink of the lock activating signaled her stay, as she ran to the corner where a refuse bucket lay and regurgitated for a long time.   
  
Still dry heaving, she wiped her face with the gray sleeve of her clean arm and leaned against the wall with her head bowed. Woe of sadness, a burst of anger and a curse of the gods she screamed and kicked at the damp and mossy wall.   
  
The sun's rays were beginning to creep into the small cell that had a small round portal for fresh air to filter down into the humid and dank confined area. Jitar kicked at the hay into a large pile in the center of the room, and sat upon it cross-legged glaring up at the glaring personification of doom.   
  
"If you are quite done, I would believe you to be the most foul mouthed wench. I am Lithloan, I am here to take your confession, miss."   
  
"Go stick your rod in a guillotine!" Jitar hissed, staring up through the vent shaft, not turning to the voice directed at her.   
  
A sarcastic chuckle echoed from the cell across from her. "Shaddap!" She commanded. The laughter fell to muffled giggles from the aged and ragged youth.   
  
"If you are able to write, I can leave some parchment and charcoal behind for you to sign upon." Lithloan replied, ignoring the taunt directed at him.   
  
Jitar fumed internally and externally, she was loosing control of her life by the second and they wanted her to sign it away? She slowly stood up and walked to the cell door where a young boy, garbed in the cheapest looking guard's uniform looked back at her. He stepped a few feet away from the iron bars instinctively.   
  
"I will ne'er sign a damn document of guilt, go crawl back to yer mother and suckle welp!" Jitar hissed at Lithloan.   
  
"As you wish, milady." He bowed sincerely and walked off, leaving a raging woman behind him to stew in the cell.   
  
Jitar didn't expect such a submissive answer, being used to the company of men she expected a retort about her situation. She was left stunned again and could not find verbalization of her frustration, so she merely screamed in anguish.   
  
It was not until sunset before Lithloan returned again, with her charcoal and parchment rolled in his hands. He pushed the items through the bars as Jitar slept, sitting against the wall. "Milady, these items have been given to report your confession." Lithloan explained, "We would like to have your story before your execution next week." He spoke calmly and without emotion.   
  
'He must be an adept at tormenting prisoners like this.' Jitar thought to herself. She slowly lifted her head to glare at the young man. "No." She stated and waited for a reply.   
  
Lithloan nodded and bowed to her, and retreated back to where he came. Jitar went back to sleep until the sun shone through her dark and dismal cell the next day.   
  
After waking up and stretching her body, sore from sitting against the slimy wall all night long. She did have a rotund figure, more than a normal man would like. But she did have muscle to back up any lack thereof a womanly hourglass figure. She seemed more rational and logical now, her thoughts spinning with faces of enemies and so-called friends. "Who would target me like this? Who has the motive to get me out of Solanthus or eliminating me entirely through legal ways? This cannot be a random fate that I had happened in." She muttered out loud while looking up through the vent above. She determined it was almost noonish and no one had dare approached the hall, with its cobbled walk, the sounds of the rats scurrying about was almost difficult to drown out.   
  
Thinking back to two eve's ago, Jitar had not really paid attention unless it was her coin and dice. Serpent's Bite was a high-risk game with many outcomes and illegal for anyone to participate in Solanthus due to its rules of self-mutilation and death for those who did refuse to do so if they had lost. Jitar had a good roll, a dragon and griffon and she turned to the old man next to her and handed him the dice.  
  
"Her' yaw go and wish's yaw the best of Habakkuk's luck." Jitar said, picking up the bone dice to be placed in the man's hand. He was in his late fifties, and looked like a nobleman. But no one that Jitar recognized before in the city. She knew most of the noblemen and has turned away from being employed and even courted because of her somewhat known reputation of risk taking, gambling, and drinking.   
  
"He's always watching me missy." He replied as he rolled a toad and roc. A good roll, but not enough to beat the current high roll by Jitar.   
  
Jitar was torn from her memory of two eves' ago by footsteps walking down the hall. She turned from where she stood, the sunlight hitting the floor behind her, causing her disheveled look more threatening with her glare.   
  
It was Lithloan again, bringing a bucket and pouring bowls of gruel for the prisoners. 'He must be a rookie.' Jitar thought. She changed her glare into a more submissive look and accepted the meal. It tasted terrible, but it was something to fill her stomach up since the last time she had anything was ale that night before the murder.   
  
She nodded and gave the bowl back to be used for her neighbors. She wiped her chin from hastily gulping down the mush and licked at her stained sleeve for every piece that could not fit in her mouth.   
  
She turned back to the remaining three walls of her cell, and yelled. "Flies balls! How am I going to get myself out of this?" She was not a religious person but closer to agnostic. She never thought of praying to unseen beings for help before, and she was in a desperate position. She did not remember any rituals for prayer but inwardly; she hoped someone would come to comfort her in her last days in Solanthus.  
  
It was only a few hours later when she had a visitor again. It was Elaurian. He had a grave look on his face as he approached the door. "You look like hell." He commented.   
  
Jitar frowned back at him; she wasn't in the mood for small talk. "What the hell is going on Elaurian? I got framed for murdering my own employee!" She jumped up from her seat and approached the door. The guards escorting Elaurian eyed the exchange warily.  
  
"I would have come sooner, but I wanted to know as well. Wekax is torn up about this too, I had to sing him to sleep and lock him in the cellar to prevent any further public damage. It seems whomever did this covered their tracks well. Jitar, just hang in there, we'll get you free as soon as we find the real killer." Elaurian reached through the bars and lightly touched Jitar's face, with a surprised look from her. The guards leapt forward and grabbed Elaurian by the shoulders and began to drag him away. Elaurian held onto the bars for one more moment to shout, "My love! The Iron Ale House will always wait for us!"   
  
Dumbfounded, Jitar stood there with her eyes bulging and her mind reeling in disbelief. This was very unlikely behavior coming from her bard! Then she noticed, colored in weaponblack, that he attached a small lock pick onto the back of the bar, away from the guards view. Signaling back to him she shouted over the scuffling, "Take care my love!"  
  
Blushing both outwardly and inwardly she pulled the pick off of the bar and removed the gluey sap that allowed it to stick temporarily to the bar. She thought about attempting her escape immediately, but warned herself that it was still daylight and escape is not possible at the time. Hiding the pick in the corner of the room in the crack along the floor, she covered the spot with hay, and waited.  
  
Lithloan again returned with another meal service to the corridor. Jitar being the unruly sort, she passed on the idea of tripping the acolyte up but did not. She took a small swallow of her gruel and went along with eating every bite, distastefully. Lithloan was about to speak to her, but shook his head and moved onto the next cell.   
  
The evening came and night fell, and Jitar became more nervous and excited at ideas of escape. She could not believe that she was going to attempt an escape from the city jail. Never in her life had she ever thought of seeing from the inside of the bars. Fingering the carved design on the pick, she had scared herself a few times as she went to pull it out and approach her cell door, when an untimely guard powdered by. Her anxiety was running high, and hopes were crashing and rising like a storm tide. She waited for the fifth guard to pass on patrol before she began picking the lock through the doors. With an easy click, the lock opened and she pulled the door aside. Excited whispers began to ask her to release them, from the torment of the city jail. She tossed the pick into another cell where excited hands began to fumble for the lock with the new tool.   
Turning left and right, she decided to stride towards the end of the corridor with the stairwell leading upwards to the courtyard. Voices from above startled her and began to come towards the entrance to the stairwell. Turning the other way, she ran full force down the hallway and pushed her way through the wooden door at the other end.  
  
Before turning around she heard a smirky voice say, "Oh ho! You brought a friend with ye this time? There'd be enough of me for the pair of ye!" Turning a glance over her shoulder she grinned, almost laughing as a lady in red was entertaining a half dressed guard. The gal, not liking to share, she gave a hard glare at Jitar and growled, "Get out!" to her.  
  
Agreeing with the command, Jitar opened the door and returned to the corridor only to find a number of guards shoving prisoners back into their cells. Lithloan was amongst the crowd of bodies and looked up at Jitar. "You forgot one!" He pointed at her. "Get her!"  
  
It was as if she grew wings, fear crept to her head and she began to run down the right hand corridor and ran up the stairwell into the courtyard. The courtyard was strangely silent. No patrolling guards or sounds from the stable were heard. Then two massive hands grabbed her from behind. She screamed and fought with her captor, until she heard his voice.   
  
"Now missie, do not be giving us away. It would be a disaster if we were to all get arrested." Wekax said.  
  
As if the fight left her body, she giggled hysterically underneath the huge palm and went limp. Relieved that Wekax was here to help her, she allowed him to carry her towards the gate of the prison, where Elaurian waited with a cart and horse.   
  
"Your doing?" She asked.  
  
With a nod and a cackle, Elaurian strapped the lute to his back opened the gate to show a prepared cart for their escape. "I was sufficiently loud enough but we still have a few awake, lets get out of here."  
Wekax placed her on the back of the cart to allow her to hide herself within the stacks of goods and supplies. He and Elaurian both climed aboard the cart and casually began to leave the city.  
  
Then she realized that she might never come back again. "Wait! What about the-?"  
"The Inn is locked up and secure. Don't worry; it will be here when we return, with the killer. There is nothing that will be getting near that place for awhile." Elaurian chuckled, giving silence to Jitar to speculate about what he had done.  
  
The next morning after a bumpy sleep, Jitar awoke with a crate digging into her back. Rubbing the bruised spot, she moved the cover so she could poke Elaurian. "Is it safe?"  
  
"It is safe as it's going to be, Wekax doesn't hear anyone following us."  
  
Slowly stretching her muscles, she realized that she accumulated a few bruises along the trip already. Getting up and joining the two on the front of the wagon she looked ahead at the sunrise over the plains of wild grass. "No going back I guess? I am going to miss my investment."  
  
"Don't worry about it. I have a few friends keeping an eye on the place. As soon as we find who set you up, we'll get you cleared of any wrongdoing." Elaurian replied.  
  
Wekax chuckled aloud. "Miss, I think we should concentrate on getting that done as soon as possible, since we do not have any idea what plans Elaurian set up before he left."  
  
Jitar looked across the plains as they travel southward towards New Sea. She thought about the home she had left behind, the murder, and the troubles that her companions will now have alongside her. She assumed that Elaurian was taking them towards Kyre or Lemish, to hide until they can return to Solanthus to find out who really killed Josh and set her up for the murder. 


End file.
